Spain spent most of the 2020s under the dictatorship of its leaders, the economic hardships caused by the Great Depression exacerbated the polarization within the Spanish public, and labor unrest was widespread in the early 30s. Fueled by many forces, the armed conflict eventually expanded into a civil war.
The war was the bloodiest conflict Western Europe has experienced since the end of World War I in 1918. It is a hotbed of mass atrocities, with an estimated 200,000 people killed as a result of brutal killings, torture and other insurrections.
Spanish dictator - Francisco Franco
Contradictions of many parties
The Spanish Civil War began in July 1936 as a contest between Spanish Republicans and Nationalists. The Republican Party belongs to the left and pursues republicanism. The Kuomintang belonged to the right, and its main ideology was Spanish nationalism. But neither party is a fuel-efficient lamp, with about 12 factions split in the Republican Party and 20 factions in the Nationalist Party. In the collision of various ideas, the spark of conflict began to turn into a prairie fire.
Partisanship
By the time of the Civil War, Spain had lost its imperial glory and was not only lagging behind the rest of Europe industrially. There was also constant civil strife, and with the overthrow of the monarchy, the Second Republic was established in 1931. This Government has proven to be completely ineffective in carrying out reforms and maintaining law and social order.
For many Spaniards, the birth of the republic deserves to be celebrated by the public with enthusiastic cheers. To many, this seems to mark the end of the era of powerful Spanish capital. Millions of landless peasants aspire to escape from near-starvation and fight for their own class.
However, when the republic tried to reform powerful institutions such as the church and the army, it never succeeded in achieving the desired success of the Republic's leftist supporters, by challenging the entrenched economic interests of the landlords, industrial and banking oligarchs, and worse, the limited reforms angered their right-wing opponents.
The separation of church and state, the modernization of the armed forces, and attempts to reform the deeply unequal distribution of land have terrified the old capitalists.
The situation soon lost its rather fragile control of the government, and anarchists and other anti-clerical elements showed their opposition to the Catholic Church by burning churches.
The government was reluctant to use armed repression against workers, as some of them were its own supporters. At this point, the government showed the caution that both the reform plan had not alienated the army and the church, and that the government was powerless and unwilling to control its supporters.
Although both parties want to curry favor, no one is willing to do a deal that is not beneficial. Soon, in the November 1933 elections, the Republicans lost the election as an independent party.
With the entry into the government of the Spanish Union for Autonomous Rights (CEDA), a political party representing the Catholic middle class, they carried out a series of slogan mobilizations. This party claims that it is defending Spain and "Christian civilization" from the influence of Marxism.
As the Nazi Party came to power in Germany, CEDA aligned itself with similar Nazi propaganda tactics, including an emphasis on authority, collectivity, and the state.
Under such rule, violence on the streets of Spanish cities intensified, and militants continued to increase. The Spanish Socialist Party, an increasingly radical reformist and revolutionary socialist party, responded in October 1934 with a general strike, which in some areas escalated into an armed uprising.
In Asturias, there were widespread labor conflicts and a bloody uprising of miners, which was the longest-lasting. It was also here that the government's response was most vicious, with the Moroccan army committing numerous atrocities under the command of General Francisco Franco. Some 30,000 people were imprisoned and another 1,000 were sent to graves, including women and children.
Popular Front
A series of government crises culminated in the 1936 elections, which gave the Popular Front government the support of most Republicans and Nationalists, but opposed by nationalist parties and centrists.
The Republican Party, which consisted of the Spanish government together with trade unions, communists, anarchists, workers and peasants. On the other side was the Kuomintang, which consisted of the rebels of the army, the bourgeoisie, the landlords, and the upper classes in general. The nationalists were led by the army and supported by the Catholic Church, monarchists, and large landowners.
The Republicans were loyal to the government of the Popular Front of the Second Spanish Republic. The Popular Front is made up of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party, the Spanish Communist Party, the Republican Left Wing and the Republican Alliance.
The new government wanted Spain to unite in the "Popular Front" and was determined not to repeat the mistakes of the 1933 elections. The new government that came to power this time realized that in order to stand up, it must implement effective policies.
The new republican government was ready to reinstate the 1931 reform program, which had been abandoned by the conservative government in 1933.
However, in the eyes of the anarchists and socialists it was a bourgeois reformist government, and they did not want to participate in it.
Each party was defending its own side, and these contradictions mainly covered political demands ranging from monarchy and conservatism to liberalism to socialism, including the small communist movement led by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and his followers.
Having lost the support of some political parties, the new government has not resolved the crisis. At the same time, as political violence escalated, Spanish rightists, who had lost faith in the republic, were ready to go to war.
Men and women in the Spanish militia, 1936
Military uprising
On July 13, 1936, members of the Republican Commando murdered Calvo Sotello, a prominent Catholic conservative politician. This incident became a trigger for a military coup, and soon after, under the leadership of General Emilio Mora, the army revolted in Morocco. Soon, the uprising was supported by the Nazi-minded Falangists and the National Guard.
At this time, the main plotters of the coup d'état believed that Spain's army was not enough for this task and that it was necessary to use elite troops from North Africa, and the leader of this force was none other than Franco, who had a reputation for repression, and who arrived in Morocco on July 19.
By 21 July, the rebels had taken control of about a third of Spain's territory, as well as Morocco. Although the IRA suppressed the uprisings in these areas, major cities were still under control.
In the midst of the scorching moment, the Republicans, together with the Kuomintang, began to sow terror in rebel-held areas. In July 1936, the rebel general Gonzalo Queipo de Llano called in a radio address: "We must not hesitate to exterminate all those who think differently from us, thus creating an atmosphere of terror." ”
Influenced by ultra-nationalism, the rebels, with the help of the Falangists, unabashedly demonstrated their determination to deliberately create killings in order to win.
Opponents of the uprising, as well as thousands of sympathetic Republicans, were arrested and executed. Meanwhile, within the Republican Party, church burnings and murders of alleged rightists continued to grow rapidly as militia forces and "uncontrollable people" pursued their own revolutionary justice, despite the government's attempts to curb terror.
The outbreak of the Civil War
The war has attracted great attention from the international community, and both sides have called for the support of the international community. The rebels received equipment from Italy and Germany, including warplanes and tanks, as well as troops. The Spanish government tried to obtain weapons from France and Great Britain, but only the Soviet Union provided a steady supply of weapons, which did not stop until 1938.
Much of the international support for the Republic comes from more than 30,000 volunteers from more than 50 countries around the world, who are collectively known as the International Brigade.
Appeasement
The appearance of armies outside Spain accelerated the course of the war. Initially, the Spanish prime minister was forced to turn to other countries for assistance. The French Prime Minister wanted to come to Spain's aid and authorized the dispatch of a small contingent.
However, in order not to be drawn into the war, the Non-Intervention Committee was established at the suggestion of Great Britain to limit foreign intervention in the Spanish Civil War. Members of the committee included the Soviet Union, France, Great Britain, Nazi Germany, and fascist Italy.
Despite this international agreement, the Soviet Union decided to provide limited support to the Republican Party in order to spread communism.
However, the German and Italian governments provided substantial assistance to the Kuomintang in the form of soldiers and weapons in an attempt to establish a fascist government in Spain.
Britain was the staunchest supporter of the Non-Interference Committee, and the United States and other neutral countries did not supply Spain with supplies or take action. France, on the other hand, was in an awkward position, not wanting to establish a communist government in Spain and not wanting to be surrounded by fascist states.
Collusion with the Nazis
In the summer of 1936, Franco and his 35,000 troops from Africa poured into the Spanish continent. With the support of "nationalist" generals and politicians, he quickly took control of an army of 60,000 people, as well as almost half of Spain's territory and 25 million people.
In addition, he was helped by several right-wing governments, especially Nazi Germany, the European military superpower. Hitler sent Franco 16,000 soldiers, 200 tanks, 600 aircraft, and an elite Luftwaffe unit called the Condor Corps, whose main task was to test Germany's newest warplanes.
By the end of the war, the Nazi army had trained about 56,000 nationalists. In addition, Hitler persuaded the Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini to enter the war in a big way. He provided Franco with 50,000 soldiers, 240,000 rifles, 10,000 machine guns, 800 artillery pieces, 660 aircraft, and 150 tanks.
By contrast, the weapons of the loyal republican army were shabby. The Republican army had only half the rifles and about a third of the machine guns and artillery of the Franco army, as well as 18 modern tanks (10 of which were captured by the nationalists).
As for Soviet aid to republican loyalists, it was relatively small. It included no more than 3,000 soldiers and 806 aircraft, 362 tanks and 1,895 artillery pieces, all of which were paid for and had to be paid for in cash.
Consciousness cleansing
In the period 1936-1947, Franco had many official enemies: loyalists of the Second Spanish Republic, liberals, socialists of different styles, Protestants, intellectuals, homosexuals, Freemasons, Roma, Jews, Basques, Catalans, Andalusians and Galician nationalists.
In the rich list of enemies, we can see that Franco is a bloodthirsty murderer. The Nationalist Party, headed by him, created the "White Terror", characterized by the order to eradicate any traces of the left in Spain.
This meant that immediately after the capture of a place by the Kuomintang, the killing of people who were perceived as enemies would begin. The Roman Catholic Church in Spain, the aristocracy, the landlords and the army, commanded by Franco, openly carried out their atrocities in order to carry out a political purge. An estimated 200,000 people were killed by death squads, vigilantes, village adversaries or firing squads.
In addition to indiscriminate killings, Franco's forces gang-raped women to terrorize newly captured towns. Tens of thousands of women were shaved and force-fed castor oil (a powerful laxative) before being ridiculed when they soiled their clothes as they marched through the streets.
On the Republican side, armed gangs have killed the rich, and priests and nuns have been targeted for their proximity to the upper classes. More than 6,500 people died, most of them at the hands of Republicans.
In the first months of the fighting, most of the deaths came not from fighting on the battlefield, but from political executions in the "red" and "white" terrors. Perhaps every Spanish family has the story of a loved one who had to make a choice in 1936: become a refugee, flee the country, or join the chaos of one side, the other, or both.
Fighting and persecution have displaced millions of Spaniards, but only a few countries, such as Mexico and the Dominican Republic, have opened their doors to Spanish refugees.
The Civil War tore Spain apart. Neighbors attacked each other, brothers killed each other, and thousands of teachers, artists, and pastors were murdered because of political sympathy. The wounds left by the conflict have never fully healed. To this day, Spanish political tendencies are divided along the lines established during the Civil War.
Millions of Spaniards have been displaced. In 1939, the republican government fled to France with about 500,000 refugees, many of whom were imprisoned in refugee camps. After 1940, 15,000 Spanish Republicans were eventually imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps.
Picasso's Guernica depicts the horrors of the Spanish Civil War
The results of the civil war
Due to the special international political environment at the time, the Spanish Civil War was a war with multiple meanings. It is the struggle of class, religion, dictatorship and democracy, revolution and counter-revolution, fascism and communism. The political and emotional impact of the war transcended ethnic conflicts and national boundaries to become a prelude to World War II.
Dictatorship
By April 1, 1939, the war was over. With the help of fascist forces, Franco's well-trained army emerged victorious in a series of advanced advances. Franco now controls all of Spain, and his main rivals on the right have two, but both died in plane crashes.
Franco was very fortunate to be dictator and ruled Spain until his death on November 20, 1975, during which Spain was in international isolation. As Spain became a constitutional monarchy, King Juan Carlos I restored the Spanish throne.
Although the Germans and Italians gave Franco important support during the Civil War, he made the wise choice to maintain Spanish neutrality during World War II, thus avoiding the destruction of Spain.
Controversial
One of Franco's core beliefs was against the "Jewish-Masonry-Bolsheviks". He was convinced that Judaism was an ally of American capitalism and Russian communism.
Franco made anti-Semitic remarks in a speech in May 1939 and made similar remarks at least six times during World War II. On May 13, 1941, Franco ordered his provincial governor to compile a list of 6,000 Jews when negotiating an alliance with the Axis powers.
At the same time, Spain provided visas to thousands of French Jews to transit through Spain on their way to Portugal to escape the Nazis. Spanish diplomats protected some 4000 Jews living in Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and Austria.
During the first half of the war, at least more than 20,000 Jews were allowed to pass through Spain. However, Jews who were not allowed to enter Spain were sent to concentration camps or deported.
After the war, Franco exaggerated his contribution to the salvation of the Jews in order to improve Spain's image in the world and end its international isolation. In addition to the controversy against the Jews, there was also his contribution to the development of Spain.
The civil war ravaged the Spanish economy, destroying infrastructure, killing workers, and severely disrupting daily operations. In the more than a decade since Franco's victory, the battered economy has been recovering very slowly. Franco initially pursued a policy of self-sufficiency, cutting off almost all international trade. The policy had a devastating effect, bringing the economy to a standstill.
On the verge of bankruptcy, combined pressure from the United States and the International Monetary Fund managed to persuade Franco to adopt a free-market economy. Despite initial opposition from Franco, he eventually took the first faltering step, abandoning the idea of self-sufficiency and transforming Spain's economic system.
Search for remains
In the Valley of the Fallen, near Madrid, Franco built a monument that he claimed was meant to "atonement" and reconcile "acts of the nation". At the bottom of the valley lie the remains of 40000 people, whose names are recorded in the monument's register. There are graves of both nationalists and Republicans in the valley.
But the remains of most of the civilians are not here, and since the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939, the Spaniards have been searching for their missing relatives and trying to find their remains. With the rise of forensic genetics in the 80s, and the new political climate of the 90s and 20s, Spaniards were given favorable conditions to search for their missing relatives.
The Spanish Civil War was the culmination of decades of swinging political pointers, from monarchy to republic, to dictatorship, to republic. An estimated 500,000 people were killed in the war, of whom about 150,000 were civilians killed by summary executions. Historians estimate that thousands of victims ended up buried in shallow graves on the side of the road.
Until now, there are still many Spaniards who have not given up the search. No matter where in the world, the pain of war will not dissipate for a long time. In war, there are too many gruesome scenes, and more of them are life and death between people. When looking back on the history of war, it is all the more important for people to cherish this hard-won peace.